Charles V., who saw his ambitious plans for the government of the world failing everywhere, and whose bodily strength was failing also, left Germany in disgust, commissioning his brother Ferdinand to call a Diet, in accordance with the stipulations of the Treaty of Passau. The Diet met at Augsburg, and in spite of the violent opposition of the Papal Legate, on the 25th of September, 1555, concluded the treaty of Religious Peace which finally gave rest to Germany. The Protestants who followed the Augsburg Confession received religious freedom, perfect equality before the law, and the undisturbed possession of the Church property which had fallen into their hands. In other respects their privileges were not equal. By a clause called the "spiritual reservation," it was ordered that when a Catholic Bishop or Abbot became Protestant he should give up land and title in order that the Church might lose none of its possessions. The rights and consciences of the people were so little considered that they were not allowed to change their faith unless the ruling prince changed his. The monstrous doctrine was asserted that religion was an affair of the government,—that is, that he to whom belonged the rule, possessed the right to choose the people's faith. In accordance with this law the population of the Palatinate of the Rhine was afterwards compelled to be alternately Calvinistic and Lutheran, four times in succession!
The Treaty of Augsburg did not include the followers of Zwingli and Calvin, who were getting to be quite numerous in Southern and Western Germany, and they were left without any recognized rights. Nevertheless, what the Lutherans had gained was also gained for them, in the end; and the Treaty, although it did not secure equal justice, gave the highest sanction of the Empire to the Reformation. The Pope rejected and condemned it, but without the least effect upon the German Catholics, who were no less desirous of peace than the Protestants. Moreover, their hopes of a final triumph over the latter were greatly increased by the zeal and activity of the Jesuits, who had been accepted and commissioned by the Church of Rome fifteen years before, who were rapidly increasing in numbers, and professed to have made the suppression of Protestant doctrines their chief task.
This treaty was the last political event of Charles V.'s reign. One month later, to a day, he formally conferred on his son, Philip II., at Brussels, the government of the Netherlands, and on the 15th of January, 1556, he resigned to him the crowns of Spain and Naples. He then sailed for Spain, where he retired to the monastery of St. Just and lived for two years longer as an Imperial monk. He was the first monarch of his time and he made Spain the leading nation of the world: his immense energy, his boundless ambition, and his cold, calculating brain reëstablished his power again and again, when it seemed on the point of giving way; but he died at last without having accomplished the two chief aims of his life—the reunion of all Christendom under the Pope, and the union of Germany with the Spanish Empire. The German people, following the leaders who had arisen out of their own breast,—Luther, Melanchthon, Reuchlin and Zwingli—defeated the former of these aims: the princes, who had found in Charles V. much more of a despot than they had bargained for, defeated the latter.
1558. FERDINAND OF AUSTRIA EMPEROR.
The German Diet did not meet until March, 1558, when Ferdinand of Austria was elected and crowned Emperor, at Frankfort. Although a Catholic, he had always endeavored to protect the Protestants from the extreme measures which Charles V. attempted to enforce, and he faithfully observed the Treaty of Augsburg. He even allowed the Protestant form of the sacrament and the marriage of priests in Austria, which brought upon him the condemnation of the Pope. Immediately after the Diet, a meeting of Protestant princes was held at Frankfort, for the purpose of settling certain differences of opinion which were not only disturbing the Lutherans but also tending to prevent any unity of action between them and the Swiss Protestants. Melanchthon did his utmost to restore harmony, but without success. He died in 1560, at the age of sixty-three, and Calvin four years afterwards, the last of the leaders of the Reformation.
On the 4th of December, 1563, the Council of Trent finally adjourned, eighteen years after it first came together. The attempts of a portion of the prelates composing it to reform and purify the Roman Church had been almost wholly thwarted by the influence of the Popes. It adopted a series of articles, to each one of which was attached an anathema, cursing all who refused to accept it. They contained the doctrines of priestly celibacy, purgatory, masses for the dead, worship of saints, pictures and relics, absolution, fasts, and censorship of books—thus making an eternal chasm between Catholicism and Protestantism. At the close of the Council the Cardinal of Lorraine cried out: "Accursed be all heretics!" and all present answered: "Accursed! accursed!" until the building rang. In Italy, Spain and Poland, the articles were accepted at once, but the Catholics in France, Germany and Hungary were dissatisfied with many of the declarations, and the Church, in those countries, was compelled to overlook a great deal of quiet disobedience.
1559.
At this time, although the Catholics had a majority in the Diet (since there were nearly 100 priestly members), the great majority of the German people had become Protestants. In all Northern Germany, except Westphalia, very few Catholic congregations were left: even the Archbishops of Bremen and Magdeburg, and the Bishops of Lübeck, Verden and Halberstadt had joined the Reformation. In the priestly territories of Cologne, Treves, Mayence, Worms and Strasburg, the population was divided; the Palatinate of the Rhine, Baden and Würtemberg were almost entirely Protestant, and even in Upper-Austria and Styria the Catholics were in a minority. Bavaria was the main stay of Rome: her princes, of the house of Wittelsbach, were the most zealous and obedient champions of the Pope in all Germany. The Roman Church, however, had not given up the struggle: she was quietly and shrewdly preparing for one more desperate effort to recover her lost ground, and the Protestants, instead of perceiving the danger and uniting themselves more closely, were quarrelling among themselves concerning theological questions upon which they have never yet agreed.
There could be no better evidence that the reign of Charles V. had weakened instead of strengthening the German Empire, than the losses and the humiliations which immediately followed. Ferdinand I. gave up half of Hungary to Sultan Solyman, and purchased the right to rule the other half by an annual payment of 300,000 ducats. About the same time, the Emperor's lack of power and the selfishness of the Hanseatic cities occasioned a much more important loss. The provinces on the eastern shore of the Baltic, which had been governed by the Order of the Brothers of the Sword after the downfall of the German Order, were overrun and terribly devastated by the Czar Ivan of Russia. The Grand Master of the Order appealed to Lübeck and Hamburg for aid, which was refused; then, in 1559, he called upon the Diet of the German Empire and received vague promises of assistance, which had no practical value. Then, driven to desperation, he turned to Poland, Sweden and Denmark, all of which countries took instant advantage of his necessities. The Baltic provinces were defended against Russia—and lost to Germany. The Swedes and Danes took Esthonia, the Poles took Livonia, and only the little province of Courland remained as an independent State, the Grand Master becoming its first Duke.
1567. THE GRUMBACH REBELLION.